Since the development of chain saws, these devices have been primarily used in the logging and tree trimming industries. Substantial improvements, have been made in this type of equipment in recent years which have made them appealing to noncommercial purchasers.
With the present fossil fuel shortages and the spiraling cost of cord wood for use in stoves and fireplaces, a tremendous demand has been created for chain saws and related equipment. Since these saws are stored quite often over an extended period of time during the off season as well as being transported in vehicles not specifically designed for this purpose, the providing of containers to both protect the saw and prevent it from the snagging on surrounding items have been developed.
These containers have been in the form of everything from relatively heavy, bulky boxes to molded plastic cases generally conforming to the exterior shape of the saw. The box like containers, of course, are heavy and bulky and generally undesirable, particularly for noncommercial usage. The contoured cases on the other hand, although space saving as compared to box like containers, still require an unusually large amount of space, especially when shipped from the manufacturing plant to the consumer outlet. Because of this "shipping of air", transportation cost of the prior art cases or containers are unusually high. Due to the unsymmetrical configuration of the chain saw, nesting of case parts for shipment as well as other breakdowns of the same have not been deemed impractical. Other attempts at reducing shipping costs of these containers have been made but to the present have not provided a practical solution to the problem.